I'm Still Me Or: When The New New New Doctor Sees Rose Tyler
by sopranish
Summary: All that matters, even after 300 years, is that he is still The Doctor and she is still Rose Tyler. ["I'm still me" is from Doctor Who, Journey's End]


When he'd picked up Clara that Wednesday he'd meant to show her Tudor England. Well, under Henry VIII, that is. He wasn't ready to face Elizabeth yet. Or again. He wasn't sure anymore.

"Come on ya slowpoke, or 1533 will catch up with us on its own," he calls up the stairs as he lets himself into the house.

"Come on yourself," Clara says from behind him, already waiting in the garden, all satisfied smirk.

The Doctor turns around to give some epic retort, and he sees it. The TARDIS's sign says "Bad Wolf". Every line. And across the top. Again.

"It can't be," he's already running as the TARDIS starts to hum and whir on her own. Thankfully Clara has the presence of mind to run after him.

They close the doors just in time to be thrown into flight through the vortex.

"Doctor, what's going on? What's Bad Wolf? Where are we going?" The Doctor hardly hears her questions. Because this can only mean something very bad. But it could also mean…he can't eve bear to think it for fear of disappointment.

Within minutes they land, hard. The Doctor runs to the door, but puts up a hand for Clara to stay back. Peering out the door, they seem to be in an open, grassy field. They seem to be on Earth, perhaps New Earth. There are a few tents around the other edge of the field, open like shops. He realizes it's one of those historical playscapes called a Renaissance Fair. People without time travel do hilarious things.

"Doctor what's out there? Where are we? When? The monitor doesn't say anything," Clara seems, understandably frantic.

"It's ok, I think. Let's have a look."

They step out into the grass- definitely Earth, no apple grass- and hardly take two steps before he sees her. The slightly faded jeans in a strong stance, a tight yellow t-shirt, blonde hair swinging as she looks around. Rose. Rose Tyler. Just standing there. It's impossible.

But impossible doesn't matter because she's Rose and she's standing there, looking a little terrified and lost among the happy scene, and he's running toward her without a thought. She sees him coming, and looks almost stricken before she takes a defensive stance, deciding whether to run away.

"Rose!" he cries. "Rose, wait!" He finally stands a few feet from her, and is only stopped from grabbing her by the lack of recognition in her eyes. Right.

"Rose, what are you doing here? Who are you with? What's going on?"

"I'm with my, um, friend… he's been showing me all the inaccuracies with the fair, but then… he sort of vanished…." She looks around briefly but comes right back to looking him in the eye. The Doctor almost laughs because, well, that does sound very much like him, and like a fun day. But it's not one he remembers having with her. He vaguely wonders why Clara hasn't caught up. He'll explain it to her as soon as he finds words for it. "Who are you?"

"Rose Tyler. You're still so pink and yellow and brilliant…" he almost chokes, and then she's looking at him with recognition, and near terror.

"What? You… why would you say that? You can't…" She starts looking around even more wildly.

"Of course I can, it's still true. Rose, it's me, The Doctor."

"No, he was right here. What did you do, did you capture him? Read his mind or something? Bring him back right now. The TARDIS is still there where we landed, so you can't have made him fly her. Where is he, what have you done?" She's nearly hysterical.

"Rose," he says gently with a sad smile. He leans down and puts his hands on her little shoulders. "Rose, look in my eyes. Rose, it's me. Just three hundred years on and probably a bit worse for the wear. New New Doctor. Well, New New New Doctor, I suppose," he corrects himself, then looks back at her, crooked smile fighting with all the other emotions in his face.

"But…" As she looks in his eyes, studies his face, something occurs to her. She looks down and reaches out her hands tentatively, looking back in his face to see if this is alright. He knows he's grinning. She really is brilliant. She pushes his jacket away slightly and puts her hands over his hearts, and he nearly crumples in joy as she sighs, relieved. After so much loss, so much fighting. Here is Rose Tyler and her warm hands over his hearts. It's nearly too much.

He takes a deep breath, and Rose gasps, looks up at him, stunned. "You're… you're still, you?"

"I'm still me," he answers. He remembers, horribly, the last time they said this. The next time, for her. She obviously doesn't even know yet. He swoops down and hugs her as tightly as he can, pulling her up with him until she's swinging her legs like she used to do, still does, with his former self.

He kisses her cheek and says into her ear, nearly into her neck, "My Rose. Three hundred years, and then here you are. You're amazing." She laughs, not used to him saying things like that so openly, or kissing her cheek and her neck so many times.

He sets her down and she says, blushing a little, "Doctor…you've definitely changed at least a little, then. And you did used to have fashion sense, didn't you?"

"Oi!" he cuts in, hand automatically adjusting the red bowtie offsetting his smart tweed blazer, "Bowties are cool." He smiles, feeling lighter than air. Than a great number of other lighter substances, actually.

The Doctor turns around, expecting to see Clara either behind him or watching from the TARDIS, but she's nowhere to be seen. And the TARDIS he sees before him isn't his own, but his former one. Bad Wolf.

He turns back suddenly, "Rose, did you see a girl behind me? Did you see another TARDIS?"

"No, you just ran out of the TARDIS… another girl?" She tries so hard not to raise her eyebrows.

"I'll explain her later," he evades. "But the TARDIS brought me here, and I don't remember doing this with you, and now apparently I'm missing, and so is the person who came with me. Something's very wrong." Her large eyes are wide as saucers, but then her jaw sets.

"The Doctor, well, you, saw a sign across the way there," she points off to the far right edge of the tents, "And he took off running. I tried to follow him, but I couldn't catch up, and then suddenly he was gone. But when I got to where I thought he'd been going, there were all these banners. I think they were supposed to be different languages, but to me they just said 'Bad Wolf'. I was about to run to the TARDIS, and then here you are…."

"I, he's, already explained that to you, then? Bad Wolf, what happened back… when I regenerated?"

She nods, "I remembered most of it eventually," she looks down and blushes, and still puts her hair behind one ear, the dear, "And 'I think you need a Doctor' is still the worst line I've ever heard. But considering you let yourself regenerate just to save me, I think it's ok." He had no idea she remembered that part, which means his younger self probably doesn't either. Cheeky, she is.

"Good, then" he tries to stay on task. "Well something pulled me here, to this day that I don't think actually happened for us, and pulled them, and my TARDIS, somewhere else. None of that can be good, so I suggest we get on it."

Thankfully after some psychic cajoling, the TARDIS lets him in. Well, it lets Rose in, and begrudgingly lets him in. She seems to know this regeneration will kind of smash her up a bit.

It takes more cajoling to get the controls working, but eventually he sees it. The TARDIS had crossed her own path so many times in one spot, it had created a bit of a whirlpool, which would suck anyone psychically connected to her back and forth. "Well, whaddya know, something even I didn't know the TARDIS would do?" He jumps around hitting buttons, and delights in making Rose giggle at his "antics", as she puts it.

But then she says, "You're so much the same, but so different. Even more lanky and fast talking, but clearly as much more sad as you are more cheerful on the outside. What happened?" He evades the question with a raise of his eyebrows, and a flourishing pull of the lever that sets them off lurching into the Vortex. And then they're busy hanging on for a bumpy flight, laughing when it knocks them over when it lands, as they always did.

They land where the others have been pulled, only a few miles away about five hundred years earlier. When The Doctor steps out, it's wooded, only a small clearing and no tents of any kind, authentic or otherwise.

"Doctor?" Rose calls out. And The Doctor is glad because it's awkward to call out to oneself.

They come running, the younger Doctor and Clara, clearly as shocked and mystified. Rose runs out and hugs her doctor hard, and he looks at his older self, more dismayed than baffled.

"How. What did you do. What did I do. What…"

"Don't worry, I'll explain in a moment," the older Doctor answers.

Clara comes out from a clump of trees, looking relieved and surprised herself. The older Doctor gathers her in a looser hug than she probably deserves, and kisses the top of her head lightly.

"Hey you. You ok?" He looks her up and down she smiles, nods, looks a little mystified. "Did you find my TARDIS?"

"Since you lost it, yah."

He rolls his eyes, "She lost herself." He explains it all to the both of them.

Eventually he sends Clara off to his TARDIS to check she's ready to go, and the younger Doctor goes in his own TARDIS to check her out, giving The older Doctor and Rose a moment.

"So, another girl. I'm not with you anymore?" She tries to sound teasing, but the sadness and fear in her voice is unmistakable. Always brave, this one. She doesn't even know how much yet, and how that bravery and his own stupidity will change her, make her harder. Not this Rose, all open and loving of everything in the universe.

"Don't worry, Rose. I can't tell you how, but you'll be ok." She looks down at the ground even more. "Rose, listen to me. Look at me." She does. He holds her shoulder with one hand, the other cupping her cheek and going through her hair.

"Rose, listen to me. You need to try very hard to remember what I tell you, because you probably won't remember today ever happened once the TARDIS takes you somewhere farther to correct herself. Will you try?" She nods, a bit wild.

"Rose, it's been three hundred years since I've seen you. And I can tell you that I still miss you every single day. Everything else, everyone else, doesn't change that. Every 'me' will always miss you, and always need you. It's part of who I am, it's very 'me' to need you, I suppose. And to love you. Rose I need you to try to remember that. That I love you so much," he holds on even tighter as he feels her shock. "You will be ok, and you will change. But you need to know that, if I could, I would keep you with me, always. So would he, believe me. I wouldn't be The Doctor if I didn't love one fantastic little pink and yellow hairless ape with a mum who slaps me far more than I really deserve."

At that she's smiling, eyes brimming over. And he can't help it anymore, he leans down and kisses that wide smile he's missed for centuries. To his surprise, she kisses him back, and fully. His hand goes deeper in her hair and his other arm wraps around her waist, pulling all of her close. The softness of her, the thrumming energy, the warmth, all of it. They kiss on and on, and she's the one to first tease at his lips with her tongue. He opens to her, the kiss deepening, tongues and mouths exploring. She holds him more tightly, one arm around his shoulders as he pulls her up to him, one hand at the back of his neck, until there's no space between them.

He knows, sadly, that his younger self will probably never pluck up the courage to do this so properly, and she'd simply wait for his cue. He hopes she somehow remembers any of this, because she deserves so much more.

Eventually they part, lips holding on to one another and coming back for small, chaste kisses. He knows he has to let go, but it's Rose, how can he? How could he ever? Feeling his own eyes on him finally makes him look up, but he just pulls Rose in and tucks her head under his chin, and hugs her that much more tightly. The younger Doctor swallows hard and simply stares, the shock and question evident in his dark eyes. The Doctor stares back, tries to communicate how important this is without saying a word. The other Doctor surely also knows it's unlikely they'll remember anything, and he knows he won't take enough of the hint in time. But then again, maybe some things in time can be slightly rewritten.

Eventually The Doctor pulls away, and looks down at his Rose. The younger Doctor hides discreetly inside the TARDIS door, pretending to just come upon them now. The Doctor looks up at him, kisses Rose one last time on the cheeks, her lips, and finally her forehead.

"Have fun, Rose Tyler, with that one, even if he doesn't have my cool fashion sense," He says loud enough, smiling. And then adds in her ear, "And try to remember."

He kisses her cheek one more time, squeezes her hands that he's holding, kisses them too as he looks in her eyes, and then steps away. She's still staring at him as he gives a little salute to the younger Doctor, waves again to Rose, and forces himself to turn and walk away.

As he's walking toward his own TARDIS, he hears his former voice, still odd to his ears, "Since we have to get out of here, how about something fun? Maybe an Olympics at some point?". And the answering, bubbly, slightly stunned, "Sure, sounds great."

And if his knees buckle slightly and he has to hold on to a tree for a moment, well, that's not to be helped.

He just hopes she can remember, just a little. That as long as he's still The Doctor, he will still love, and be made better by, Rose Tyler.


End file.
